


An Impression

by Weevilo707



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Hijinks & Shenanigans, i guess in a way?, the boys are curious about taako's voice, voice study
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-10
Updated: 2018-09-10
Packaged: 2019-07-10 13:18:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15950147
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Weevilo707/pseuds/Weevilo707
Summary: Taako could tell when those three idiots were up to something. It wasn't hard after knowing two-thirds of them over over a century. He was having a hard time figuring out exactly what it was they were on about this time though. Whatever he'd thought it was, he'd certainly hadn't been expecting the actual answer.He didn't get what was so weird about his voice.





	An Impression

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DarkrystalSky](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkrystalSky/gifts).



Taako wasn’t an idiot. Maybe he thought so in the past but as it was now he knew for a fact that he wasn’t one. Because he wasn’t an idiot, he could tell when something odd was going on around him. More specifically, he could tell when his idiot friends had some idea in their heads.

And he was pretty damn sure said idea was focused on him.

The only issue he was having was figuring out exactly what dumbass thing it was this time. There was definitely something though, and he figured he’d humor them long enough to find out what it was.

God though, was it a fucking hassle and a half to try and piece together anything that even remotely made sense from the actions of those bumbling chucklefucks.

Taako was pretty sure the first of them to try anything was Magnus. It was obvious that whatever he was doing, he was trying to be subtle. At first at least. The problem with that was despite all the rogue training he was still about the least subtle person Taako had ever met. So they’d be talking, and he could see Magnus squinting at him, like he was trying to figure out a sudoku puzzle scrawled across his face.

“Something up my dude? Got a math problem that needs solved?” he asked, and Magnus shook his head.

“Huh? Oh no there’s not a- forget it, you were saying something about your new school?” he said, changing the subject back to what Taako had been rambling about before. He supposed he could press it, but it hadn’t seemed like too big of a deal yet. Just Magnus being weird, which honestly wasn’t that strange at all.

When it happened a few more times, it still didn’t seem like an issue.

And then he got back into that oh so fun habit from the beach year. Taako was starting to get tired of nearly blasting his ass with a fireball every time he jumped out from behind a potted plant shouting his own name. He fucking swore Magnus was only targeting him with this ‘surprise training’ too. At least back then it had been mutual torment for all of them.

Every time he’d jump out Taako would yell and then start snapping at him about how close he came to killing his ass. It took a few times for Taako to notice the strange, attentive look on Magnus’ face in those few seconds after jumping out. Like he was expecting Taako to do something.

Whatever the fuck it was, apparently he never did it. Not only did Magnus keep up with the occasional irritating jump scares, but soon enough it became apparent that he wasn’t alone in whatever inane mission he’d set out for himself.

If he had to guess Taako would say it was a few weeks after Magnus started jumping out at him that he dragged Merle into it. Taako kind of hoped that it would explain some things, because Merle was definitely not the best at keeping a secret. He also was possibly the only person even less subtle than Magnus at trying to figure out specific information.

Taako could tell something was up when he started the conversation. Part of it was because of the blatant fake casualness Merle had going on.

The other part was because Taako could feel a zone of truth being cast over them. Annoyingly it caught him off guard enough that he wasn’t able to resist the spell.

“Are you for real? What here requires a zone of truth?” he asked.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Merle said, and Taako huffed in irritation. Of course Merle had to save too so he couldn’t even ask him what the point of all this was.

“Ugh, can you just ask me whatever it is you want to ask me so I can get outta this goddamn spell?” he asked.

“I mean, I still don’t know what spell you’re talking about,” Merle started.

“Zone of truth motherfucker, you practically cast it in your sleep at this point,” Taako cut in. Merle ignored him though, continuing on.

“But I guess if you want me to ask you something, can you say the word, uh, effervescent?” Merle asked, and Taako frowned in confusion. Of all the things, he could say that wasn't one he saw coming. 

“Yes?” he answered, because that was the truth, he  _ could _ say effervescent. He couldn’t think of if he’d used that word recently but he didn’t see why that would be important in the slightest.

“Okay, say effervescent,” Merle said, and Taako was glaring in annoyance at him now.

“Effer-fucking-vesent. We good, can I go now?” he asked, and Merle shrugged like he didn’t really care.

“I wasn’t ever holding ya here, you can go whenever,” he said, and with that Taako got up and left the area of the zone of truth. He didn’t have a single clue what that was about. It didn’t even end up being a one time thing either. Every so often Merle would try casting zone of truth on him, to varying levels of success, and ask him to say random words.

Between him and Magnus, Taako couldn’t make heads or tails of what it is they were after. Which only made it even more annoying when he realized it wasn’t just the two of them going at it.

As it was, he’d give Angus credit on being more stealthy than Magnus or Merle ever were. Taako couldn’t say for sure when the kid had started getting involved in all this. He couldn’t even be 100% sure that he wasn’t in on it from the beginning. For one thing, Angus always looked like he was thinking about something other than the current topic at hand. Taako had a feeling that was because he always  _ was  _ thinking about other shit. So it was pretty hard to tell if Angus was analyzing him more than the regular base amount of analyzing the kid typically did.

So Taako wasn’t able to tell if Angus was up to something until he started trying to spy on him. Sure, he had pretty decent stealth, but it was best used against strangers who didn’t bother paying attention to little kids. When he was straight up trying to sneak around though, it wasn’t hard for Taako to feel like someone was following him.

Of course Ango wouldn’t come clean on whatever the reason for all this sneaking around was. Taako tried to pull some sort of pattern out of what he was doing when the kid spied on him, but so far there didn’t seem to be any. Sometimes he’d be haggling down store prices, sometimes he’d be on a date with Kravitz, sometimes he’d just be chilling with Lup. If there was a pattern, Taako had yet to find it.

He'd about had it when one day he was walking out of his bedroom and went ass over teakettle tripping over Angus. For some godforsaken reason the kid was hiding behind his door. Taako hadn’t noticed him, not paying attention as he sang some song he half remembered from the Legato cycle to himself.

“The fuck my dude?” Taako snapped, trying to situate himself from where he was sprawled on the floor.

“Ow,” Angus said, not paying much attention to him. He was rubbing his head where Taako was pretty sure his knee had somehow managed to collide with him. He also wasn’t paying attention to the little flip notebook that was lying on the floor next to him now. Without thinking twice Taako grabbed it, starting to scan over the pages as quick as possible. That certainly seemed to catch Angus’s attention.

“Oh, sir wait,” he objected, trying to grab it back. Taako scrambled back to his feet, holding the notebook out of Angus’s reach. After a moment he managed to find what he was pretty sure was the page he’d been taking notes on when they collided.

“Subject uses the same voice when alone as with other people. No noticeable changes to singing voice,” he read out loud, frowning and spinning away from Angus who kept trying to snatch the book back. “What the fuck am I looking at here?” he asked.

“It’s nothing sir, give me my notebook back those are confidential detective notes,” Angus said. Taako rolled his eyes, flipping through a few more pages but not finding anything that gave him a clue about what was going on. Giving up with that, he tossed the book back to Angus.

“Is there something wrong with my voice?” he asked. Angus clutched the returned notebook to his chest, shaking his head at the question.

“Of course not sir. It’s not- these aren’t about you, they’re about, um, someone else. I can’t say who or it might compromise the investigation,” Angus lied. He was a pretty good liar but this one was very clearly a lie.

“Is that what Magnus and Merle have been acting so weird about? My fucking voice?” he continued to press. He guessed it did make sense. It would explain why Magnus would look at him weird when he spoke sometimes, and why he kept trying to make him scream. It would give a reason as to why Merle kept fucking telling him to say random words. It would even give a bit of a pattern to when Angus was spying on him. It was nearly always when he was talking to someone else.

“Er, no?” Angus said, and yeah he wasn’t even trying to hide it anymore.

“Seriously? Those jackasses should be used to these golden sounds that spill from betwixt my lips after a hundred goddamn years,” Taako complained.

“Uh, I gotta go sir, I’ve got a spell- um, I left a delayed blast fireball in the… kitchen, so I should, uh, bye,” Angus stumbled out before running from the room. Taako was half tempted to catch him with a hold person before deciding against it. He could interrogate all three of those idiots about this later. Instead, he huffed and dusted himself off one last time.

He’d let them stew for a little while longer knowing that he at least figured out part of the reason why they were acting so strange. Sure it still didn’t make any fucking sense to him, but he could deal with that later too.

It might’ve been occupying his mind a bit more than he thought though. That night when he was chilling out with Lup he found himself complaining about it. Something probably prompted the discussion, maybe. He might’ve just started rambling on about it though, whichever one it didn’t much matter.

“So get this. Mags and Merle have been acting weird lately, and like, I don’t think much of it because when aren’t those assholes acting weird. But then I see they got the kid detective in on it, and I corner him and it turns out it’s something about my voice? Like what the fuck? There’s nothing wrong with my voice,” he complained. He wasn’t surprised when Lup started laughing at that, but he was surprised by what she said.

“Holy shit, are they seriously still hung up about that?” she asked, and Taako frowned in confusion.

“Hung up about what?” he asked, and Lup shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal.

“Oh, so you know how you’re fucking top notch at impressions and shit?” she asked and Taako nodded.

“Natch, what of it?”

“I can’t remember what we were talking about, but somehow Magnus mentioned how our voices sound a lot alike? So I joked that you started imitating me when we were little and now neither of us can remember what your real voice sounds like,” she explained. Taako stared at her for a moment before bursting out laughing.

“Holy shit, seriously? And they believed you?” he asked, and Lup was laughing too as she nodded.

“Fucking apparently,” she said, and okay, that actually explained a lot. It was ridiculous, because of course he wasn’t copying Lup’s voice, but it explained why they were all hung up over it.

“I can’t believe they actually thought you were serious. I’ll have to let them wrack their brains over it a little bit longer before spilling the beans that you’re full of shit,” he said.

“Give em some credit, it’s not that unbelievable,” Lup said, and Taako frowned slightly once again.

“It’s pretty damn unbelievable,” he said.

“Hey I’m just saying, you already copy everything else from me. You took my cool umbrella, you got yourself an undead boyfriend…” she started listing off. Before she could get very far Taako tossed a throw pillow at her head.

“You forgot about stealing your massive ego too,” he said, but Lup just nodded in agreement.

“Right, that too,” she said, and Taako laughed again.

While he did, he found himself listening to his voice. It sounded like him, he wasn’t trying to put on a voice or anything.

Right?

Despite all rational thought Taako still found himself in his room alone that night, speaking aloud to himself.

“I’m Taako, you know, from TV? My name is Taako. My  _ name _ is  _ Taako,” _ he repeated, and yeah, it sounded like him. It also sounded like Lup, but they had similar voices. Of course they did. They were pretty much the only constant each other had growing up, of course they ended up pronouncing words and shit the same.

This was still his voice though. It was just how he spoke and he wasn’t sure why it was bothering him like this. He’d know if he was copying someone else’s voice, even if he’d started when he was a little kid.

At the very least, his voice might have gotten messed up when Lup had been erased from him during those ten years. That didn’t happen though, he’d always sounded like himself. Honestly, after a hundred and some years, it was pretty damn dumb of Magnus and Merle to think he’d been keeping up with some fake voice all this time. Even if by some chance it had started by imitating Lup, it was definitely what he sounded like now. It was  _ his _ voice.

But hey, if they wanted a different voice from Taako, he’d give them a different voice.

Taako might’ve spent most of the next day invisible, following people around until finally, Magnus, Merle and Angus were all in the same place. Then he oh so casually walked into the room.

“Sup my dudes,” he said simply, not paying them much mind. He could tell all their eyes were on him as he pretended to scan a bookshelf that was in the room.

“Uh, Taako?” Magnus asked, sounding uncertain.

“What’s up?” Taako asked back. His voice was much, much lower than it normally was. He almost sounded like Garyl.

“You got something in your throat there?” Merle asked.

“What, are you guys getting voidfish static or some shit? Cause that’s pretty serious if you are,” he said, turning back towards them. Angus was shaking his head though, and Taako knew that wasn’t the case anyway.

“No sir, you’re putting on a voice for some reason?” he said, and Taako pretended to frown in confusion.

“Don’t have any idea what you’re talking about, I’ve always sounded like this,” he insisted. He could see a quick flash on Magnus’ and Merle’s faces at least, like they were making sure that they weren’t remembering wrong. Which that in and of itself was pretty damn funny.

“No you didn’t sir. We’re really sorry if we bothered you about your voice too much,” Angus said. Taako wasn’t too surprised at him being the one to call him out on this.

“We are?” Merle asked, which Taako also wasn’t surprised about.

“Yes, we are,” Angus repeated. Taako shrugged again, grabbing one of the books off the shelf at random before starting out of the room.

“Well damn, I’m sure that would mean something to me if I had any idea what you were talking about. And maybe if I knew what you were talking about I’d say something about being careful what you wish for or something along those lines. Unfortunately cha’ boy here is clueless,” he said, still using that deep voice as he left the room. He ignored the three calling after him as he left, humming in a low tone to himself.

In the end he managed to last about a week using that fake, deep voice almost exclusively. In the end everyone begging him to go back to normal outweighed the amusement he got at using it. It was a close fucking call, but he kind of wanted to go back to his real voice.

After all, he really did like his voice.

**Author's Note:**

> another request for darkyrstalsky. this was a super fun one, Taako is just a real fun character to write. 
> 
> as always, thanks for reading and i hope you enjoy~


End file.
